Jim Cast
Headquarters, Washington, DC January 21, 1998
(Phone: 202/358-1779)
Dom Amatore
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL
(Phone: 205/544-0031)
Barron Beneski
Orbital Sciences Corp., Dulles, VA
(Phone: 703/406-5528)
RELEASE: 98-11
NASA COMMITS TO SECOND VEHICLE FOR X-34 PROGRAM
NASA has modified its X-34 contract with Orbital Sciences
Corp., Dulles, VA, to produce a second flight vehicle for the X-34
Program. "The purpose of a second vehicle is to reduce risk to
the X-34 program," said deputy program manager Mike Allen of
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL. "One of the
lessons we learned from the Clipper Graham program is that it is
desirable to have a second flight vehicle available, especially if
it can be acquired at a relatively low cost." Clipper Graham was
a previous technology demonstrator that NASA flew four times in
1996, until it was destroyed during landing.
Under the new arrangement, X-34 test objectives are being
expanded, adding, for example, unpowered tests to the flight
profile. A second vehicle also will provide flexibility in
demonstrating various technologies, Allen said, allowing testing
that requires repetitive flights to continue at the same time as
tests which require significant, time-consuming changes to the
vehicle.
In August 1996 NASA entered into a $50 million contract with
Orbital Sciences Corp. to design, build and test-fly the X-34, a
small, reusable technology demonstrator. An additional $10
million was committed by NASA to be spent in direct support of X-
34 by NASA Centers and other government agencies. Now the
contract has been increased by $7.7 million to purchase long lead-
time hardware, including a new wing, fuselage, avionics set,
hydraulic pump and actuator system, and more. NASA has committed
$2 million more for the government to provide wind tunnel testing,
additional testing and analysis, and a second leading-edge Thermal
Protection System.
An $8.5 million option calls for purchase of shorter lead-
time hardware, such as navigation systems, while a $1.8 million
option has been added for assembly of piece parts into subsystems,
integration and final assembly. These options should be formally
exercised shortly.
The X-34 is a single-engine rocket with short wings and a
small tail surface. The vehicle is 58.3 feet long, 27.7 feet wide
at wing tip and 11.5 feet tall from the bottom of the fuselage to
the top of the tail. Capable of flying eight times the speed of
sound and reaching an altitude of 250,000 feet, the X-34 will
demonstrate low-cost reusability, autonomous landing, subsonic
flights through inclement weather, safe abort conditions, and
landing in 20-knot cross winds.
The X-34 is designed to bridge the gap between the earlier
Clipper Graham, or DC-XA, subsonic demonstrator vehicle, and the
larger, more advanced X-33 vehicle. The X-34 will demonstrate key
technologies applicable to development of a future Reusable Launch
Vehicle. The overall goal of these vehicle programs is to
demonstrate the key technologies needed to dramatically lower the
cost of putting a pound of payload into space.
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